Bank wealth management market returns under pressure; some products lower performance benchmarks

Source: Shanghai Securities News | Author: Xu Xiaoxiao

Recently, the stock and bond markets have been continuously experiencing volatile pullbacks, causing some chill in the bank wealth management market. Under the dual pressure of a systematic decline in underlying asset yields and strengthened regulatory constraints, wealth management product yields have continued to fall, and multiple leading wealth management companies have recently and intensively lowered their performance comparison benchmarks.

Despite facing downward pressure on returns, the overall market operation remains stable, and there has been no redemption wave. Funds are flowing back from deposits to the wealth management market on a structural basis. Insiders say investors can adjust their wealth management plans appropriately and stay clear-headed when choosing products, avoiding “yield ranking” products.

Wealth management returns continue to fall

“Previously, when buying wealth management products, the returns weren’t high, but they were still around 3% to 4% annualized. Now, just looking at it, those returns are also going down.” Shenzhen investor Chen Wan (pseudonym) told a reporter from Shanghai Securities News.

The “lighter weight” of the wallet bag is not a psychological effect. According to Puy i Standard data, over the past half month, the overall yield of the wealth management product market has been moving down. As of March 15, the average annualized return over the past year for wealth management products across the entire market was 2.32%, down 7.9 basis points year over year. Among them, cash management and fixed-income (low-risk) products fell by 0.33 basis points and 3.35 basis points, respectively, year over year.

As market risk-free yields fall, deposit rates and bond yields decline in tandem. Coupled with the volatile pullback in the bond market, the overall yield midpoint for fixed-income assets has shifted downward. Net asset values of wealth management products based on fixed-income assets as their “mainstay” are generally under pressure.

Last week, the A-share market saw volatile differentiation. The bond market overall retreated, and the pattern of a steepening yield curve remained unchanged. Yields on actively traded 10-year government bonds returned again to above 1.80%, and yields on actively traded 30-year government bonds returned again to above 2.27%.

“Against this backdrop, fixed-income asset products are hard to support the past performance benchmarks.” Tian Lihui, a professor of finance at Nankai University, said in an interview with a reporter from Shanghai Securities News. The “Measures for Information Disclosure of Asset Management Products by Banking and Insurance Institutions,” which will take effect on September 1, requires performance comparison benchmarks to remain consistent and, in principle, not be adjusted, which in turn forces institutions to “switch anchors” ahead of time—changing the way performance comparison benchmarks are set from a fixed value type to a market interest rate type or an index-linked type.

Also, according to the reporter, the regulator’s recent “crackdown” on the chaos of “yield ranking” in the wealth management market has begun to show initial results. In the past, some institutions relied on small-scale funding to “star-make” in order to win high-yield rankings—this operational space has been thoroughly squeezed. Wealth management product yields are accelerating their return to true investment levels, gradually shedding the “paper” element and moving toward the “real.”

Performance comparison benchmarks are concentratedly lowered

With the overall yield of related fixed-income assets continuing to fall, many wealth management companies have recently adjusted the performance comparison benchmarks of some wealth management products. Zhongyou Wealth Management, Agricultural Bank of China Wealth Management, Minsheng Wealth Management, Xingyin Wealth Management, and others have successively issued announcements, stating they will lower the performance comparison benchmarks of multiple products under their management.

For example, Minsheng Wealth Management lowered the performance comparison benchmark of its “Guizhu Fixed-Income Enhanced Two-Year Periodic Open 2” product from 4%–6% to 2.6%–3.1%, a reduction of nearly 50%.

Insiders believe this is essentially wealth management institutions using the transition period before policy effectiveness to completely clear out existing historical burdens.

“Currently, the benchmark reduction moves by wealth management firms are basically being timed at the product’s ‘regular open day’ or ‘before the next investment cycle begins,’ which fits the current regulatory framework.” A research staff member from a certain Shenzhen financial think tank said in an interview with a reporter from Shanghai Securities News. “Although in the future, performance comparison benchmarks ‘in principle shall not be adjusted,’ institutions can still re-price the benchmark for the next cycle based on the objective facts that macro interest rates are falling and bond market yields are declining, and, according to law, issue announcements in advance—thereby giving investors full ‘redemption choice rights.’”

The researcher explained that if investors do not accept the new performance comparison benchmark, they also have ample time windows to redeem funds and exit during the open period. This cross-cycle dynamic adjustment is, in essence, a “re-contracting” between the two sides of the transaction before the new round of operation cycle begins, aligning with the market-oriented and rule-of-law regulatory direction of “the seller is accountable, and the buyer bears responsibility.”

With falling returns compounded by seasonal factors, the size of the wealth management market declined somewhat in January. According to Choice data, in January 2026, the bank wealth management size across the entire market shrank by 114.2 billion yuan. In February, it then gradually flowed back. According to a research report from Guotai Haitong, as of the end of February 2026, the outstanding scale of bank wealth management products reached 31.66 trillion yuan, up 5.6% year over year, and up slightly by 0.3% month over month.

No “redemption wave”

Although the net asset values of wealth management products are affected by volatility in the stock and bond markets, there are currently no signs of a redemption wave. The market only shows small fluctuations, and overall operations remain stable.

Zhou Yiqin, founder of Shanghai Guanyi Information Consulting Center, said in an interview with a reporter from Shanghai Securities News that in recent years, investors have gradually adapted to a low-return environment, and funds are showing structural reallocation. “The earnings performance of competing public mutual fund bond funds for wealth management products is also not ideal, and their attractiveness has decreased. Against this backdrop, bank wealth management products, with their steady risk-return characteristics, have seen their scale recover steadily and have become the main force for absorbing funds.”

He expects that in the second quarter, the yields of wealth management products are very likely not to experience a trend-level decline. They may fluctuate in a range of 2.2% to 2.4%. The pace of lowering performance benchmarks may slow down, and overall they may stabilize around the current level.

With the normalization of net asset value volatility and the deepening of regulatory rectification, investors’ previous wealth management plans are facing new challenges and adjustments.

Tian Lihui suggests that steady investors can adopt a “core-satellite” strategy: using high-dividend dividend assets as the “anchor,” and supplementing with a small portion of “fixed-income+” products to enhance returns, rather than waiting for a turning point or switching across the board.

Tian Lihui said: In terms of bottom-holding allocation, dividend/dividend-yield assets are becoming a consensus choice for wealth management institutions; their characteristics of high dividend payouts and low volatility offer long-term allocation value in a low-interest-rate environment. In terms of return enhancement, “fixed-income+” products can increase return resilience through multi-asset strategies such as convertible bonds, gold, and equities, but the equity allocation must be strictly controlled at 10% to 20%. In terms of liquidity management, cash-type wealth management products are still an indispensable tool, but investors should lower expectations about the contribution of their returns.

A research analyst at a leading brokerage reminds that investors should not be tempted by short-term high-yield products and can choose products with a high pass rate and a smooth net asset value curve.

(Editor: Wen Jing)

Keywords:

                                                            Wealth management